Supreme Court Over and Under
Now that Kerry has conceded, it's time to get ready for the next great political battle. What's the over and under for when President Bush gets resignation letters from Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justice Sandra Day O'Connor? They are 80 and 74, respectively, and who have both suffered from or (in Rehnquist's case) are suffering from cancer.
My guess: the letters are in the mail, which means we'll be having hearings in January or February. Rehnquist and O'Connor will correctly read this as the best possible time for them to go and for conservative replacements to be nominated, because the Senate is 55-44, and the President has political capital to spend.
Who gets the nominations? Tough question.
My guess: President Bush will want to appear conciliatory with the Dems, so he will nominate Justice Breyer, a Clinton appointee, as Chief Justice, which won't cost him any votes on any important cases, but gives the appearance of bipartisanship. Then he can nominate conservatives to fill the associate slots opened up by Breyer and O'Connor. I would choose an intellectual heavyweight like Alex Kozinski of the Ninth Circuit as one, and I would look for Bush to follow in his father's footsteps and nominate Janice Rogers Brown from the California Supreme Court as the first African-American woman justice. That gibes with his "compassionate conservative" streak, would probably insulate her from really tough hearings, and would look good in the history books.
UPDATE: An important question is, of course, how the President will overcome the Dems' filibusters of appointments. Perhaps it won't be as big an issue with S.Ct. justices, since, after all, they can't obstruct forever, because you have to have nine of them. But that's probably wishful thinking. So we have to think about how we can turn five Dems away from their party on the filibuster issue. Here are the Democratic Senators from red-states that went to Bush by 10% or more who will be up for election either in 2006 or 2008:
Ben Nelson
Neb.
35% (Bush margin of victory)
2006 (up for reelection)
Kent Conrad
N.D.
27%
2006
Tim Johnson
S.D.
21%
2008
Max Baucus
Mont.
20%
2008
Mary Landrieu
La.
15%
2008
Jay Rockefeller
W.Va.
13%
2008
Mark Pryor
Ark.
11%
2008
That's seven targets. (I've left off Robert Byrd of W.Va., who's up for reelection in 2006, because I view him as a complete party hack.)
My guess: the letters are in the mail, which means we'll be having hearings in January or February. Rehnquist and O'Connor will correctly read this as the best possible time for them to go and for conservative replacements to be nominated, because the Senate is 55-44, and the President has political capital to spend.
Who gets the nominations? Tough question.
My guess: President Bush will want to appear conciliatory with the Dems, so he will nominate Justice Breyer, a Clinton appointee, as Chief Justice, which won't cost him any votes on any important cases, but gives the appearance of bipartisanship. Then he can nominate conservatives to fill the associate slots opened up by Breyer and O'Connor. I would choose an intellectual heavyweight like Alex Kozinski of the Ninth Circuit as one, and I would look for Bush to follow in his father's footsteps and nominate Janice Rogers Brown from the California Supreme Court as the first African-American woman justice. That gibes with his "compassionate conservative" streak, would probably insulate her from really tough hearings, and would look good in the history books.
UPDATE: An important question is, of course, how the President will overcome the Dems' filibusters of appointments. Perhaps it won't be as big an issue with S.Ct. justices, since, after all, they can't obstruct forever, because you have to have nine of them. But that's probably wishful thinking. So we have to think about how we can turn five Dems away from their party on the filibuster issue. Here are the Democratic Senators from red-states that went to Bush by 10% or more who will be up for election either in 2006 or 2008:
Ben Nelson
Neb.
35% (Bush margin of victory)
2006 (up for reelection)
Kent Conrad
N.D.
27%
2006
Tim Johnson
S.D.
21%
2008
Max Baucus
Mont.
20%
2008
Mary Landrieu
La.
15%
2008
Jay Rockefeller
W.Va.
13%
2008
Mark Pryor
Ark.
11%
2008
That's seven targets. (I've left off Robert Byrd of W.Va., who's up for reelection in 2006, because I view him as a complete party hack.)
posted by PDB at 1:20 PM
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